Does baking edibles smell like weed?

Edibles are a popular, convenient and discreet way to consume cannabis, especially in places where smoking or vaping is not allowed.

The effects of edibles last longer than smoking or vaping cannabis. The effects can last up to 6 or more hours.

Baking edibles at home is a great way to control the dosage, strains, flavors, and potency of the weed. It's inexpensive and fun.

However, the worst thing you want is to attract everyone's attention with the strong, stinky smell of damp grass.

Getting caught by parents, landlords, and other disapproving authority figures can certainly be a problem when baking edibles.

So does baking edibles smell like weed, and can you get away with it? Let’s dive into the facts and find some solutions.

How do you bake edibles at home?

Baked goods such as brownies, cookies and bread are among the most popular delicacies. These treats are often made by replacing regular butter or oil in the recipe with cannabis-infused butter or oil.

We typically bake cannabis edibles in these 4 steps:

1. Choose your favorite variety

When choosing a strain, it is important to consider the desired effects such as relaxation, energy or creativity.

Cannabis comes in sativa, indica or hybrid strains. Different strains have different cannabinoid and terpene profiles, offering different effects and potential benefits.

Sativa can increase energy and concentration, making it ideal for daytime use or at social events.

On the other hand, Indica has a calming, sedative effect, perfect for relaxing after a long day or as an aid to sleep.

Most strains found on the market today are hybrids and most are bred to increase THC levels.

2. Decarboxylate your cannabis

Before you can begin infusing your flower, you must first decarboxylate it.

Decarboxylation uses heat to convert the THCA that surrounds raw cannabis into THC.

Decarboxylation effectively activates the THC in your flowers so that it can actually produce effects when ingested.

This is also the reason why consuming raw cannabis does no good.

The usual process for decarbing cannabis is to place the weed in the oven and heat it to 220°F for 30-40 minutes.

3. Mix your cannabis with butter or oil

THC or CBD is fat-soluble and is therefore often incorporated into butter or cooking oils such as coconut or olive oil.

Vacuum seal your cannabis along with your chosen fat (butter or oil) and cook again for another 2 to 3 hours.

4. Use your cannabis infusion base in a recipe

Once your infusion is ready, follow your chosen brownie, bread, or cookie recipe and replace it with cannabis-infused butter or oil.

Does it smell like grass when baking?

Unfortunately, baking foods such as cookies, bread or brownies creates an odor.

The degree of smell can change depending on several factors, such as the specific consumable, the materials used and the method of preparation.

When making edibles, it is still necessary to decarboxylate the cannabis, and that is where the smell is most noticeable, especially when decarboxylating without a sealed container in the oven.

During the decarboxylation process, heating your cannabis activates terpenes and cannabinoids, which give off the strain's signature scent.

When you decarb large quantities of the really strong, juicy, sticky varieties. The smell of weed will be very strong and incredible.

In fact, it's a very bad sign if your weed doesn't smell strong. A strong aroma is a good indicator of effectiveness.

Mixing decarbed weed with butter smells slightly less like weed, and baking brownies, bread, or cookies with cannabutter smells the least.

If someone is in the house while you are baking edibles, it is likely that they will catch a whiff of it. But it definitely smells less pungent than smoking weed in the kitchen.

How do you get rid of the smell of grass when baking edibles?

To reduce the aroma of baked goods, you can take several precautions when preparing them:

1. Use low odor varieties

Most cannabis strains smell different. For example, sativa strains have a pleasant, fruity scent, while indica strains have a harsher, skunkier smell due to their different effects.

Although the pungent smell of the marijuana plant is immediately recognizable, there are many low-odor strains that either produce almost no smell or have odors that are completely different from the skunky aroma that constitutes marijuana.

Choose varieties for baking edibles that have a softer smell and may produce fewer flavors.

2. Use less grass

The more weed you use to bake edibles, the more intense your surroundings will smell.

By using less grass, you can reduce the smell of grass.

Make sure you use other methods in conjunction with this method to get the full benefit from it.

3. Open the kitchen window

A well-ventilated kitchen can help eliminate odors, while a poorly ventilated room can increase them.

Open windows to let in fresh air or turn on exhaust fans to remove airborne cooking byproducts, which will significantly reduce the concentration of marijuana odor.

4. Use masking agents

You might consider cooking something that contains lots of onion, garlic, fish, or other strong-smelling foods to mask or alter the smell of the flowers.

You can also do the job with air fresheners, candles, aromatherapy, air purifiers and odor removers which could help you a lot.

5. Use concentrates instead of flower

Decarbing is the most flavorful part of the baking process. You can easily skip the decarboxylation process by using waxy cannabis concentrates or oils.

Cannabis concentrates do have a certain scent, but nowhere near the skunky smell of everyone's favorite herb.

There are a number of different concentrates that you can use in your baking as desired. Especially the distillates, which smell much less than other varieties.

6. Use a sealed container instead of open goods

You can seal the weed in a glass mason jar to decarb in the oven, which is a very low odor option.

You can also use a sous vide technique to make cannabis-infused oil. This is a technique that requires you to cook the weed in a vacuum sealed bag or mason jar, which means you keep the smell to an absolute minimum.

Diploma

Edibles provide a discreet, smoke-free alternative to cannabis consumption and are preferred by stoners for a number of benefits such as discretion, precise dosage and prolonged effects.

Baking edibles will definitely smell like cannabis, especially when heated. Therefore, people baking edibles at home may want to take extra precautions to avoid attracting attention.

Fortunately, by understanding the factors that can affect the smell of food, you can take the measures we have introduced to minimize it.

But even this way you can't guarantee that there won't be any smell at all. Be aware of your surroundings and remain discreet to keep your culinary creations secret.